"Where do you see yourself five years from now?"
She rolls over in bed, away from him. And then rolls back to see his sleeping face. And away again because she needs to sleep. She needs sleep.
But she can't sleep.
Her mind is running wild, away from her, taking her with it. Taking her to places in time that she hasn't thought about in ages, or ever. To images she either pushed away or kept herself from thinking at all.
And one question brings them all back.
"Where do you see yourself five years from now?"
One question so similar to another.
"Where are we going?"
Neither one has an answer.
Her head aches with it, pounds, hurts with the pressure of her thoughts.
She rolls onto her back this time, stares at the plain white ceiling. It's simple, clean. A blank canvas on which one could paint anything, any picture, as realistic or abstract as they wish. Fantasy or reality. One future or another.
She sighs and turns away from it, turns to look at the wall again. A little more hectic. Neat, but hectic. Like her thoughts usually are.
There's nothing in this room that can mirror how wild her brain is tonight.
Nothing that can calm her thoughts, either, that can make this decision any easier. That can make her world seem less scary. Her future less abstract.
"Where do you see yourself five years from now?"
She has no idea.
She wakes up the next morning with a no clearer head, eyes burning with fatigue and the digital clock at her bedside reading 7:27.
Late. No way to start what she's sure will already be a hard day.
She pushes herself out of bed, thanks some kind of god that she doesn't need a shower this morning, runs a brush through her hair and throws it up a quick but respectable bun. It looks okay. She looks okay.
As okay as she can look on so little sleep.
A deep breath and a roll of her shoulders later, she's walking out of his office through the living room until she can spot him in the kitchen, leaning over the counter, a cup of coffee in his hand.
"Hey," he greets, smiling at her. "I was about to go wake you up."
She walks towards him, pulls herself up onto one of the barstools. "Why'd you let sleep in in the first place?" she asks. Though the greedy sip she takes when he hands her a cup of coffee seconds later probably gives away the fact that she needed it.
"You didn't sleep well." He shrugs. Like that says it all.
It really does.
It says everything. Everything she seems to need because suddenly one side of the equation that haunted her all night seems so much clearer. So much better.
"Where do you see yourself five years from now?"
This would be a pretty good place to start.
The precinct is quiet, mostly empty. The murder board bare, waiting for another case to fill it with facts and details and pictures and a timeline, like some kind of morbid bulletin board waiting for an announcement.
She walks past it and over to her desk, sets her cup of coffee down next to the ceramic parade of elephants and sits down, stares at the small pile of paperwork that lingers on her desk.
"Hey, Beckett," greets Espo. Ryan close behind.
Gates sits in her office, doing something on her computer. Ryan starts telling Espo some kind of story that makes Espo tease him in return. Castle drops into his chair and pulls out his phone.
The FBI is gone. It's her precinct again.
It's crazy, really. She's glad they're gone. Glad the FBI has given her her precinct back, given her her murderboard and her break room and her conference room—her precinct—back.
And yet she's actually debating joining them.
She grabs her NYPD pen and scribbles her signature onto the first, already filled in form. Ignores her hypocritical brain that's reminding her that she can't dislike the FBI and want to be an agent at the same time.
Does she really want to be an agent, though?
Does she want to be a detective for the rest of her life?
She glances around the precinct, at the familiar whiteboard and the espresso machine and her team—her friends—and her captain—her leader—and her partner—her boyfriend.
Her family.
"Where do you see yourself five years from now?"
Here. It was always here.
Until somebody told her it could be somewhere else.
They catch a case in the middle of the afternoon, leave the precinct as the New York sky goes as dark as it can with the constant traffic and the bright lights of the city.
They stuff into the elevator, the lack of space forcing her close to Castle. Not that that's a bad thing. Usually. When she isn't doubting herself and their relationship and his investment and their future. Not for the past few months. Before Vaughn. Before drones. Before the FBI showed up and turned her life upside down.
Ryan and Espo chat amongst themselves for the entire ride to the main floor, and she finds herself quickly asking Ryan to say hi to Jenny for them—them—before they part.
She drives back to the loft as Castle rambles about how he thinks this case will be a boring one. That with her on it, they'll get a confession sometime tomorrow.
She smiles to herself. And yet a whisper in the back of her mind is wondering whether or not she actually is meant for more than being an NYPD detective. An NYPD anything. If maybe she should try to protect more than one city, but rather a nation, her nation.
And then the rest of her brain yells at her that that would also mean giving up him. And his little compliments that make her smile. And his coffee in the morning. And the way his gaze makes her feel beautiful. His kiss, alive.
She swallows back her sigh.
"Where do you see yourself five years from now?"
She still doesn't know.
They eat warmed up pasta that Alexis cooked the other day, sitting side by side in his kitchen. The silence is warm, familiar. It would be comfortable, if not for her stupid brain and her wild thoughts and the unanswered question that haunts her.
It would be comfortable, if not for her.
She takes a slow sip of her wine, takes the deep layers of flavor, swallows them back and hopes the alcohol will somehow ease the decision. Or at least quiet the screams inside her head.
Once dinner is done, he quickly washes off their plates before leading her to the living room, his glass perched in one hand, the still mostly full bottle in the other. She grabs her glass before following, dropping onto her usual spot on the couch and setting her glass on the coffee table.
His hand finds her thigh and she all but winces, knowing the movement, the gentleness of it. Knows his curiosity, his worry, the way his gaze burns against her temple.
"Kate."
It's a whisper, as soft as the words he mumbles into her hair right after they wake up in the morning. As careful as when he whispered her name in the middle of night after their first time, asking her with unspoken words whether or not she regretted it. Whether or not she would run.
She turns to him slowly, forces a smile. "Yeah, babe?"
He inches closer to her, squeezes her leg. "You've been thinking very loudly all day," he tells her, as though she didn't already know. "Actually, well, since Agent Stack talked to you. And I know you said it's nothing, but if there is something you want to talk about, I'm here."
The "it's nothing" is on the tip of her tongue, ready to escape, but she fights it back for a second, forces herself to think before putting him at arm's length, before pushing him away.
He would understand, right? He would understand her wanting to explore her options. He would understand her keeping it from him. Her reasons for waiting, waiting until something comes of it. Or until nothing does. He would give her her space and understand. He would…
No. He wouldn't. Or he would, but he shouldn't. He shouldn't have to.
She shouldn't make him.
"He offered me a job," she tells him. Avoiding his gaze because this isn't her. But it should be. It is, now. So she looks up at him, sees his wide eyes. Shocked. That Stack offered her a job, or that she told him about it? "Well, told me about a job he thinks I'd be good for."
"With the FBI?"
She nods. "Yeah, at the, uh, Attorney General's office, in DC." Her cheeks burn. Her throat is clogged. Her heart beats a little too wildly, anxious and scared.
He's careful to keep any reaction tampered, that much she can tell from the way his Adam's apple bobs when he swallows. "In DC? And you're…?"
She presses her hand against his thigh. "I sent in my resume. Got an interview. And I…think I'm going to go," she explains. "Just to see, Castle. To see what's out there, what I can do. If somebody thinks I can do this, something bigger than being an NYPD detective."
"So…" he trails off awkwardly, a question hanging between them. A question she can't quite answer because she's not actually sure what it is. He takes a breath, a nervous, shaky breath, and his hand settles over hers. "Do you want the job?"
She sighs, actually lets it out this time.
"Where do you see yourself five years from now?"
Her eyes squeeze shut. "I…don't know what I want."
She watches from where she's sitting as he refills both their glasses of wine, and something in the back of her mind is telling her that this is not a conversation that requires alcohol, not a conversation that should involve alcohol. So when he holds her glass up to her, silently asking her if she wants a sip, she shakes her head, watches as he sets it back down.
He doesn't take a sip of his glass either, just sets it down next to hers, settles down on the cushion by her side. His hand reaches out for hers, fingers curling around her own, and he squeezes gently.
"You can tell me, Kate, if that's what you want. If you want to go to DC," he whispers.
She stares at him for a second, her mouth forming words that can't accurately describe the actual situation. The actual feelings that are swirling in her head and pulsing from her heart to every single one of her fingers and toes, haunting her and making every thought more difficult that it should be.
But there's nothing.
"Where do you see yourself five years from now?"
Nothing that can explain her confusion. Her hopes. Her desires. Her fantasies.
At least, nothing she can explain in few words.
So she tells him the only sentence that truly makes sense, the one that has been haunting her. "He asked me where I see myself in five years." Her words are a mumble, almost inaudible, even to her own ears. "And I…didn't have an answer."
"You don't know where you see yourself?" he asks. His voice gentle, comforting. Quiet and soft as he squeezes her fingers again. "Or you don't want to admit that you do?"
The way his eyes burn against her face makes her almost uncomfortable, like he can see through her, see something she can't even begin to comprehend. Things she can't even see within herself.
"I don't…know," she mumbles.
He leans towards her, hand falling from her grasp as it presses, instead, against her shoulder, pressing her back against the cushions. His fingers thread through her hair, comb it back, gently tugging her head back against the couch.
"Close your eyes," he tells her. "We're going to figure out where you want to be five years from now."
She does as she's told. Her hands settle on her thighs and her eyes flutter curiously, as she feels him pull away from her, reach for something, and then the cool stem of her wine glass.
"Take a sip. Calm down," he whispers.
So she does, slowly, carefully bringing the glass to her lips, letting the earthy flavor of the wine coat her tongue before swallowing it back. And then he takes the glass from her, and she only hears the soft chatter of it landing back on the coffee table.
His fingers wrap around hers again, and the squeeze he offers is just as gentle as the others, just as supportive. Just as him. And then his lips brush across her temple, to her hairline.
"You're gonna have to put your imagination to work, Kate," he tells her. "Okay?"
She nods. "This feels oddly like you're trying to uncover repressed memories."
He chuckles. "Not repressed memories, Kate. Repressed fantasies."
Her thumb brushes across his, and though she's tempted to look into his eyes, to see the flashes of emotion she's learned to read so well over the years, she forces herself to keep them closed. "You promise you won't get upset with me if they're not what you want?" she asks.
Because she's willing to try this. Very willing. But she can't risk losing him over it.
"I promise."
She smiles. "Okay, then, go ahead. Do your thing, whatever it is you have in mind to, uh, uncover my repressed fantasies."
He's silent for a long time, and she finds herself wanting to open her eyes again. Because she can feel him right next to her, and he's still holding her hand. So she knows he's here. Just not…what he's doing, or what his plan is, or if he even has a plan. Doesn't know what he's thinking, what he wants her to be thinking, or how she's supposed to figure out where she wants to be in five years any better now than she has for the past twenty-four hours.
She's about to give into the curiosity and end the silence when he finally speaks.
"Picture this, Kate," he whispers. "You wake up one morning, just like you always do. It's May. May of 2018."
2018. Five years from now.
"What's the first thing you notice?"
And she pictures it. Waking up to her digital clock that makes her blink at the time, 9:07, and the heat of the sun that fills the bedroom. Her bedroom. Their bedroom.
"I'm here."
"In New York?"
She shakes her head against the cushions. "In the loft."
She feels him tense next to her, is once again tempted to just look at him. To figure out if that's too much. If she's misread him. If it's not only her that's unsure about their future, but him, too.
Or, worse, if he knows where he wants to be five years from now and…he doesn't want her there.
But then he smudges a kiss to her cheek, hard and kinda clumsy, but she can feel his joy. His relief. His… Well, him and everything that he wants.
"Can you narrate from here on out? Tell me what you see instead of just answering questions?" he asks.
She feels the smile tug at her lips. "I'm no bestselling author, Castle, my story won't be all that amazing."
He squeezes her hand gently. "Okay. We're doing this for you, so we'll do what your comfortable with."
She finds herself squeezing back. "I didn't say I wouldn't do it, just that it wouldn't be a long winded novel," she corrects, and though she still can't see him, she knows he's smiling.
"Thank you," he whispers. And then she feels him go serious again, hears the emotional shake fade from his voice. "So, you wake up at the loft. Then what?"
She sinks back into the cushions, lets her head fall back and pictures it again. The numbers. The familiar bedroom. And she pictures the rest, herself. Her situation. "I'm naked." She chuckles. "But alone. You're not in the bed with me. So I get up. Well, I sit up on the edge of the bed."
She forces her imagination-lacking mind to come up with the rest, and she smiles. "We're married. That's all I have on, my wedding ring." He's holding her left hand, squeezes it and she could swear he's staring at it, as though a ring will magically appear. Her next words sure draw his attention from it, though. "And I'm pregnant."
"Pregnant?" he echoes. She nods. "How pregnant?"
"If I have to explain how I would get pregnant, Castle, I might have to rethink this."
He laughs sarcastically. "Not what I meant, Beckett," he huffs. "How far along are you?"
She rolls her head towards him, even though her eyes are still closed. "Six, seven months? Far enough along to be showing and to feel the baby move, but still not about to pop."
He hums softly. "That's the best part."
She can't stop herself this time. Her eyes pop open and she smiles at him. "Can I just tell you the rest? Or do you want me to keep picturing it?"
He looks thoughtful for a second before something—a decision?—flashes across his face. "Keep picturing it," he tells her. "Close your eyes and keep picturing it."
So she lets her eyes fall closed again, brings back the image of her, standing in the bedroom wearing one of his many t-shirts, which stretches over her baby bump and a pair of what she guesses is maternity pyjama pants. And her wedding ring. The one he put there.
In this uncovered fantasy, at least.
"What do you see? Tell me everything, Kate."
His voice is soft near her ear, his breath warm as it washes across her cheek, and she can't not listen.
"I walk out of the bedroom, through your office, and into the living room, and you're there," she tells him. A whisper because she's still not used to this, to being so open, to imagining them five years from now. And yet the image is clear, vivid. "You're there with our son. He's…three. Just turned three and he's cuddled up with you on the couch, his little blanket pressed against his nose. I…"
It's slow, so slow that it takes the loss of his hand in hers for her to notice.
"Where are you going?"
He doesn't answer, and her eyes fly open to see him crossing the threshold into his office until all she can see of him is the broken lines of his silhouette between tightly packed novels. And then he disappears behind his desk.
"You know, Castle, it doesn't take a detective to figure out your up to something," she calls out.
He appears back in the doorway, one hand lingering awkwardly behind his back. Hiding something. From her.
"Close your eyes," he tells her.
She pushes herself a little off the cushions. "I think we've uncovered my hidden fantasy, Castle. No need for more imagining my future."
He smiles. "I know. You want to be married to me and have a little boy and be pregnant with our second child. Trust me, I will never forget that," he says, but he doesn't come towards her and his left hand stays hidden behind his back. "You know, I distinctly remember you once telling me that, what was it, "If we're married, I want a divorce." What changed, Beckett?" He's teasing her, trying to distract her from whatever it is he's hiding.
It's not working, but she plays along.
"You were annoying and wouldn't leave my precinct so I figured I might as well get something good out of it, too," she says with a shrug.
He presses his hand against his chest dramatically. "Kate, I'm wounded. And here I thought it was my ruggedly handsome face and charm that finally realed you in."
She shakes her head, purses her lips playfully. "Nope. It was totally the sex and the pancakes."
He frowns, though his eyes are still gleaming with playfulness. "Well then," he says, "maybe I won't show you what I have hiding here." His left arm shakes slightly as he indicates it.
"No!" she says. A little too fast. A little too loud. She purposefully swallows and drops back onto the couch. "Please, Castle? You have my attention."
"And no more jokes about using me for my food?"
"Now you might be asking too much," she tells him. The corner of her lip, however, curls upwards on its own volition.
"Kate."
She sags back against ther cushions. "Fine. No more jokes about using you for your cooking, or anything else," she relents. "For today."
He rolls his eyes and she grins.
"I'll take it," he mumbles. "Now close your eyes."
She does as she's told, letting out a huff. "And you say I'm the demanding one in this relationship."
She can practically see his grin, even through her closed eyelids. "Well, you are most of the time. At the precinct. And there's those times when we use your handcuffs–"
"Castle," she groans.
"Right."
His footsteps are loud as he bounds over to her heavy and, when he gets closer, she can feel the buzz of excitement that surrounds him, the undertone of nerves.
What?
Then his hand lands on hers again, gentle, and he opens her fingers, sets something small, square, soft in her palm, and oh shit, she has to consciously focus on keeping her eyes closed as her mind seems to find the one logical thing it could be, the one thing she hadn't been expecting, or maybe she would have just listened sooner.
She forces her mind to shut up, surprises herself when she realizes how truly disappointed she'll be if she's wrong.
"You can open your eyes," he whispers. Quiet near her ear, soft and gentle and shaking with nerves. His fingers brush gently up and down her forearm.
She listens, feels like she's in some kind of movie, she does it so slowly, and looks down at the object cradled in her hand. A dark velvet box, a big diamond ring. She brushes her thumb across the surface of the gem, watches the light make it sparkle before looking up at him.
"I had this whole speech planned out, rewrote it more than I edit any scene in one of my books, but it couldn't beat what you just said," he whispers.
She grins. "That my dream for five years from now is to be married to you and have your kids?"
"Mhmm," he answers, leaning a little closer to her, nuzzling his nose against her cheek. "That. That was perfect, better than any speech I could ever come up with." He reaches over for the box, plucks the ring from its cushion and holds it up in front of her. "So, Kate, will you marry me?"
She holds her hand out for him. "You already know the answer."
He pulls the ring away from her hand, just a bit. "You have to tell me," he argues.
She rolls her eyes. "Why? We already went over all this."
"Because it's tradition."
She rolls her eyes again.
"Please?" he asks again. "For me?"
She stares at him for a minute, determined to not fall into that trap, before letting herself sink back into the cushions. "Fine. Yes, Richard Edgar Alexander Rodgers Castle, yes, I will marry you."
His face breaks into a wide smile as he finally slides to the ring onto her finger. And then she pounces on him, hands framing his face as she presses her lips hard against his.
"Nice touch with the full name, there," he mutters once they part.
She pulls her lower lip between her teeth and shakes her head slowly, pushes herself off the couch and pulls him with her, not giving him a response. She leads him through his office and into the bedroom, and after that, the only name he cares about is hers, based on the way he repeats it over and over and over again.
It's after, when she's wrapped in his arms and his lips are at her ear, lingering there after he's recited his overly prepared speech. When her heart is about to burst because they're engaged and he's her fiance and the speech he planned, for her ears only, is quite possibly the sweetest thing she's ever heard.
It's then that he asks the question that makes any remnants of fog dissipate.
"So, what was your job in this fantasy?"
She can do nothing but shrug. "I don't know. It didn't seem…important."
She feels his smile against her shoulder, her own face mirroring it.
Her job's not that important, but he is.